Anticipating what is likely to be a rancorous backlash from city governments over the budget-that-wasn’t, Assemblyman Roger Hernandez, D-West Covina, sent out letters to his cities explaining the devilish details.

In one addressed to West Covina Mayor Steve Herfert, Hernandez paid special attention to redevelopment – which Democrats proposed killing and replacing with an opt-in system whereby agencies would send some of their revenue back to the state.

Agencies could remain open but would have to give significant revenue to the state.

“I recognize the importance of redevelopment agencies, especially with how it could vastly improve blighted communities,” Hernandez wrote.

In the new RDA proposal, agencies would be allowed to keep about two-thirds of their tax increment the first year, and about 94 percent each year after. The remainder would go toward school, fire and transit districts, Hernandez explained.

Brown had originally proposed wiping out redevelopment entirely and diverting the $3 billion savings for schools and local governments.

He offered another consolation – AB 1235 – a bill he authored that would extend existing legal immunities to developers for brownfield projects if RDAs are eliminated.

“This is a necessary bill that will enable redevelopment to continue in California and help improve local economies,” Hernandez wrote.

By late afternoon Friday, Herfert said he had not read the letter, but had plenty to say about the fate of city governments in the state budget crisis.

“We’ve been involved with the budget this whole time … but it’s like talking to a brick wall. They do whatever they want in a block behind closed doors.”

When Hernandez was on the West Covina City Council, Herfert said, he could not have been more pro-redevelopment.

Then, “he gets elected to state assembly and it’s like he’s a different man – he can’t stand redevelopment, let’s get rid of it.”

Hernandez’s was a preemptive response.

“I was elected to the California State Assembly to make difficult decisions, and the vote on redevelopment agencies was one of the hardest votes I had to make since coming to Sacramento,” he wrote.

Calling the new RDA proposal a “pragmatic compromise,” the Assemblyman elaborated by saying he fully understands the importance of continuing redevelopment in California – but, he said, no one has been spared in the downturn, with students, the disabled and the elderly bearing the brunt.

“Everyone is upset about it,” Herfert said. “They don’t have a solution. Redevelopment is a tool to create jobs and they killed it.”

Herfert said redevelopment has been an invaluable tool in West Covina, particularly through the recession.

“We’re struggling just like everyone else, but if we didn’t have it as a tool to bring in new sales tax, we’d be worse off than we are now. We just went through public safety cuts… We get no relief from the state. All they do is take, take, take,” he said.

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